An Open Letter to the Unsuspecting:

Oh, and know that I am not talking about those who skulk around property with burglaries in mind. I speak of those who, without realizing it, are looking for you.

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These are the ones who proclaim their independence. And, they’ll do it to anyone who appears to be listening.

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What is important is to first know that there are always layers. There are layers of skin – the epidermis, then dermis, then the fat, and so on. But, there are also layers in behavior. Human behavior.

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And because, though we may look upon them fondly, we are not dogs we are people, and we have needs far beyond those of food and sleep. These needs are many, occurring first on the surface and then running deep, reaching all the way to our core of being.

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If we are self aware, we know what we need. Add to that some self education, and we can distinguish between the sources which can meet such needs. Having established these, we can then seek the fulfillment which results in needs met.

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But, if we are neither self aware nor sufficiently educated, we may become prey. This is not a good thing.

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Should somebody treat you with unusual attention, begin by stepping back. Adopt a position of observation. Feel your own breath. Know your space.

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Because unless you maintain your self as distinct from the other, you may become an extension in the realm of someone who, at the very moment you are feeling special, displaces you in the next second. This is because you are likely being sought to meet a need in that person, a need for whose meeting you are vastly unqualified.

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Remember that the way you feel in the presence of another exists only within your own perception. Do not attribute to the other any credit for such feelings. We are, at any point along the journey of life, so often assigning to others credit where none is due. Doing this causes problems between us and everyone we know.

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If you do experience nice, soothing, exciting, or otherwise desirable feelings, enjoy them in that moment. Be grateful. But, be not deceived. You are likely merely responding to a synergy which is inherently momentary.

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We converge at any moment across a spectrum. Many believe such encounters to be profoundly divine in nature; these see God as directing all. Yet others are more detached, viewing the world of life as largely random. Whichever your position, know that you are still a distinct living soul, and do not have to accept that your meeting up with any other is anything attributable to the intent of that person.

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If your encounter is pleasurable, express gratitude. But, when you separate, take the experience and store it as just that, without any further expectation. The other person is also reacting to having been with you, and may register a completely different response.

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Pain exists to warn us, to heighten our attention and increase our focus. But, some pain can be avoided. Take your attention away from false beliefs that others can meet any of your needs. This places a burden upon all our relationships which is doomed to disappointment, what some call heartbreak, and can induce acute and entirely unwarranted pain.

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Instead, return to your own soul center. Name your need, and feed yourself. Regard all others as decorative, perhaps transient, across the scheme of your own life. Give as emergent crisis warrants, help with an attitude of love, but avoid sacrifice. Be, in all ways, who you are, without fear. In this way, nobody will ever take from you that which is truly your own. No one will steal your heart.

For every rare individual, in the grip of dissociative identity disorder, there is the vast remainder of relatively normal society. And, society, whether or not we are ready to admit it as fact, seeks to shape our personalities.

The earth is populated by so many nations, within them so much distinct culture. And, what each civilized group of persons grows accustomed to is a set of mores, actions, and reactions which are profoundly influenced by the behavior of those who founded and perpetuated them.

Back in the 18th century, Scottish philosopher David Hume developed his theory of social behavior and led his fellow citizens to assimilate it. He believed that a people is profoundly marked by its public persona, and established a specific protocol for interaction. As such, the Scots as a society became characterized by Hume’s notions of what was both a healthy and proper comportment.

Centuries hence, the essence of who we are has come to be known as personality. Within that, there are potentially many subsets of behaviors, all influenced by those with whom we have had to do since birth.

(Enter DNA. We are still learning, and most of us not privy to, the exact nature of genetic expression. What we do know is that we inherit much which will shape how we choose, act, and react to the world around us.)

But, if we are encouraged, from infancy, to express a wide range of emotion — smiling, laughing, crying, giggling, as well as reactions including surprise, shock, and even dismay — we will develop habits which include these expressions. Moreover, if we are rarely taught to suppress emotion, we will become capable of spontaneity. If, conversely, we are taught to stifle, we will become characterized as stoic.

Now, what of emotional range? Could a correlation be made between the degree of emotional expression and the capacity for multiple aspects within personality?

Some scenarios seem to call for grace, latitude, and acceptance; yet others demand assertive action, such as those of sudden health emergency or public threat. The degree of importance one places upon each as they emerge might call up a wide variety of personality expressions. The Scots, in the 18th century, likely never had to endure either challenge or threat to their social securities.

And, what of intellectual expression? How do distinct personalities demonstrate the way they think? And, how is this valued in a society?

Perhaps we might reflect upon those who seem different from ourselves. What are the aspects which distinguish us? Which among these could be encouraged, deemed of value?

America is unique, in that we have been attempting to survive as a society within which innumerable social mores and personality expressions have coexisted. Proximity has proved a challenge, for many. Judgments have been made. Inherent bias has ruled outcomes of disagreement. Crime has become a hallmark, instead of a rare aberration.

Consider these points for contemplation, the next time you register the following thought: “I don’t like that person.” Perhaps add a Why? And, then, take that additional, sometimes painful but objective step. Find something worthy in that personality. Then, inspect yourself.

Each of us has so many glorious features. Even as we celebrate diversity, let us broaden that resolve to include the details of multi-faceted individuality. We would feel so much better about each other, and our collective personality would become something of a masterpiece.

Being a barnacle. Hanging on, trying harder, being mindful, vowing to practice good listening skills. Harvesting scraps, from dinner.

Denying how much the one so loved wants to leave.

He’d been talking about “incompatibility” for months. Good listening skills notwithstanding, I’d refused to hear it. Compatibility was a small thing; heck, I’d been “matched” for it at eHarmony.com in 2006, spending three weeks with a bona fide, raving psychotic. You laugh?

I thought that really caring, providing nurture, being helpful around his house, thinking of his needs first whenever I entered a store, trying to find solutions to an endless litany of problems, and being willing to drive the twenty three minutes each way to his place three, four times per week were the ways to show love. Oh, and, the big one: forgiving him all his sins. Past, and present. Repeatedly.

I was mistaken.

In the end, everything I said or did, and how I said and did it, drove him away. He couldn’t stand being around me. He only wanted me there when I wasn’t.

And so, he treated me in kind. I often found my words dismissed – grammatically and syntactically correct texts, each one requiring an intolerable twelve seconds to digest – deleted because there were just too many of them; my overall behavior frequently subjected to declarations tinged with sarcasm and outrage; sweeping generalizations about what was “normal” regularly put up as the barometer against my every act. And yet, to sum it all up, this was “just me”, and who was he to try to “change” me?

By now, with the single exceptions of downhill skiing, skydiving, scuba, performing surgery, and giving birth, everything about life had happened to me. There’d hardly been an experience to which there hadn’t been at least some tangential connection. I’d hiked to the top of Mt. Washington, reeled in a mahimahi off the Honolulu coast, and played on stage with YoYo Ma. Taught competitive marching band (not very competitively, being a poet and aesthete), choir, chorus, hundreds of strings, scores of private students, and coached/produced/directed childrens’ drama ten times in ten years. In 1984, traveled alone to Scotland, England, France, Germany and Switzerland. Written and illustrated three childrens’ books. Bought my own house at age 29, my own cello at 28, and my own Steinway at 57.

But, being dumped as a single woman, at age 61. That smelled more like terror. Who wanted an old woman, for a partner? Surely not an old man. Men were largely unteachable, to begin with, unless groomed by a registered Suzuki instructor by age 4; how could they be expected to adapt to anything, by this time?

I suppose that, just like I myself declared in the musings of a prior piece, beginning again at age 61 might entail going more solo than ever before. That multiply published author, as she traveled the college keynote circuit, never made mention of either a husband or even children. But then, the tiny one, in the bookstore. Carefully laying out all the major novels as her world for the remaining winters of her solitary existence.

So, what did I want? And, what would it be? Serving at the soup kitchen, on Christmas day? My own mother had regularly helped do the very thing, every week in the final few years of her life. She died, anyway, at age seventy six, not a day older than she was at seventeen.

Ask, and ye shall receive. But, isn’t it better to give?

Well?

I’m tired of giving. Giving up, that is – most of my entire self, for another (but, keeping the house, dammit. The only thing I hadn’t done was build it, for God’s sake.)

Maybe spreading love around is the secret. I’m a sprinter anyway, after all – good in short, intense spurts. For the long haul? The biggest load since the space shuttle crossing country on a flatbed.

No matter that the shuttle altered life on the planet as we all knew it. The shuttle was never intended to win friends or influence people, or get tucked into bed at night between the dogs and the warm, familiar embodiment of romantic idealism.

Even as a child, I was not well liked. My own mother found me irritating. And, she was quick to say so. I bore every, single trait inherited from her husband which she never knew until after he’d married her.

So, time to go.

Or, stay.

Tonight, I’ll be at my house. It’s warm, inside. Been mine, for thirty years. Plenty of space, to fill with perpetually collecting reminders of everyone who’d ever been next to me in the room, now to sit alone and think.

But, just don’t ask me to feel.

For that, I would need a really exquisite, carefully selected, and truly exceptional metaphor.

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